Retired Army General didn’t have a good first day of school as he walked to teach his first day of class at the City University of New York (CUNY).
A Youtube video dated September 9, 2013 shows a hoard of students following Petraeus as he walks shouting obscenities and things such as “War Criminal , Murderer and Piece of Sh**”. This goes on for over a minute and while we are not sure the harassment stopped after the video ended, we do know it sounds like the students were shouting every class. I assume this means after every class or everyday they would harass him.
Despite my personal or political issues with anyone in his former position of authority or any person in high government, I am not sure I would have the balls to be so cruel. The situation to me is a catch 22 in that you soldiers fight for people’s freedom of speech, however to disrespect a Veteran who has served his country for years and did so honorably bothers me.
Petraeus however handled the situation gracefully continuing to walk to his class remaining seemingly self-controlled.
I may not like the man but I would like to think if I encountered him I would treat him with some decency. Watch the video below to see what happened
The fine line of freedom of speech and border line verbal harassment was crossed in my opinion.
Feel free to share yours below in the comments.
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Army Wife 101
Krystel is the mom of two and an Army Wife. In addition to Army Wife 101 she is the Co-Founder of SoFluential.com a digital media agency that connects brands with the military market. She has appeared on MSNBC ,FOX LA and formerly was a weekly contributor to HLN's "Raising America". She has written for various outlets including Sheknows and Lifetime and is a big fan of cupcakes and french fries.
Krystel is the mom of two and an Army Wife. In addition to Army Wife 101 she is the Co-Founder of SoFluential.com a digital media agency that connects brands with the military market.
She has appeared on MSNBC ,FOX LA and formerly was a weekly contributor to HLN's "Raising America". She has written for various outlets including Sheknows and Lifetime and is a big fan of cupcakes and french fries. 3 Comments on Soldier’s Corner: SMH Poor Guy…Retired Army General David Petraeus Harassed and Heckled While Walking to New Job… Freedom of Speech or Verbal Abuse?
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These students are completely classless and should be ashamed of themselves. General Petraeus simply served his country… he didn’t not start the wars.
This heckling isn’t “anti-war” propaganda…it’s harassment. I hope the school puts a stop to this immediately.
I promise you, most CUNY students don’t feel this way about Petraeus teaching there. Most don’t know, or don’t care. He’s teaching one class of about twenty kids, all of whom are seniors at the honors college. But CUNY serves almost 500,000 students across the city. (That number is not a typo.) It’s my understanding that the honors students did debate whether or not he was the best person to come teach them, on the grounds of his wartime activities, but it was respectful and thoughtful–and private. Nothing like this. So please don’t think this represents most views at CUNY.
That said, this video wasn’t shot on a CUNY campus, it was shot on the streets of NYC. The university can’t prevent what happens in public space. I think you could probably make a public safety complaint about the way they chase him out into the road on this video–but that’s something for the police to handle, and if they weren’t there, it’s hard to call them in after the fact.
So the video is not representative of most local perspectives. It’s just getting attention because the people who made the video wanted attention–for the wrong reasons.